The present disclosure is related to methods of predicting acid-base pair interaction in xerographic developer materials. In particular, the acid-base pair interaction of xerographic developer materials is established by calculating an Interaction Surface Parameter (ISP). Using the ISP calculated parameter, suitable toner particles and surface additive particles may be selected that achieve strong adhesion with each other.
Effectively attaching surface additives to a toner particle surface is critical to high image quality and long component life. Loose toner surface additives can end up falling off of the toner surface and onto a photoreceptor, initiating ghosting or causing toner build up on the photoreceptor that results in cleaning failure with blade cleaners and giving rise to toner streaks on prints. Loose surface additives that fall off of toner may also transfer to a carrier, resulting in loss of toner charge and requiring an increased carrier replenisher ratio, which adds cost. In addition, loose surface additives that fall off of toner can also end up on the bias charging roll (BCR) in products that use a BCR, which can result in streaks on the prints. Poor additive attachment can become even more problematic as the surface additives become larger, and particularly with spacer particles >100 nm in size.
Currently, approaches that deal with this issue: 1) strongly imbed or impact the additives into the toner surface, which is also observed when toner ages in a development housing; however, this may be associated with performance in developer flow, charging, cleaning and/or transfer; 2) increase blend time or blend power; or 3) keep surface additive size small, for example less than about 100 nm in size. However, both the use of small additive size and strong additive embedding are opposite to a desire for larger additives for reduced impaction and to reduce the amount of impaction of the additives. Further, increased blend power increases energy consumption it, toner making and increasing blend time degrades cycle time and increases energy consumption.
What is still desired is an improved method to obtain greater adhesion of surface additive particles to toner particles.